Arrested a British fugitive accused of abusing his daughter 40 years ago

The suspect was located in Alhaurín el Grande, and was found guilty of continued child abuse between the ages of four and ten

Mar 29, 2017 - 1:06 PM

After two failed detentions, and other fleeing from the UK, the 69 year old British man has found his past has caught up with him, from decades ago. National Police agents made the arrest for sexual abuse nearly 40 years ago

Archive photo

Named with the initials A.J.H., he was arrested in virtue of a European Arrest Warrant, dictated by a court in Liverpool, where he was found guilty of seven crimes, six counts of indecent assault on girl aged under 13, with a maximum term of five years for each court and the crime is of sodomy which in Great Britain is a lifetime sentence.

He was first taken into custody in Feb 1996, when the British police detained a suspect in Liverpool after his daughter had registered a complaint, then overage. The women detailed all classes of abuse and sexual aggressions from the age of four until ten or between 1972 and 1978. Curiously she revealed her father had been working as a private detective between the years 1977 and 1978.

According to sources the progenitor firmly denies the accusation, and tried to establish an alibi, noting his daughter had lied about the years he was a private detective claiming in 1973 and 1974.

The court ordered conditional release and called for him to testify two month later, in April 1996. The suspect appeared, but the revision of has case had been delayed. However, in June 1996 A.J.H. failed to pay the bail as required and so an arrest order was issued.

The British authorities knew nothing for 11 years until in November 2007 he was stopped at passport control at Gatwick Airport, and noted the European Arrest Warrant. Curiously again, when he arrived at the court, he was told the case against him had been archived.

Again, granted conditional release with his passport withheld. The case had two other postponements, in the first place at the end of November 2007 and later in January 2008 – during this period the suspect had applied for another passport, concretely in December 2007 – claiming it had been lost. He regained his travel document and fled from British justice again.

The investigation obtained evidence against his main alibi: the dates he claimed he was working as a private detective – 1997 and 1998 as his daughter said. The case was then passed from pillar to post for two decades, and was only ‘reconsidered’ in 2016. The court which has taken charge resounded the evidence of the victim of seven counts of sexual abuse. Last month, the European Arrest Warrant was finally issued.

It seems, given the facts happened between 1972 and 1978, the sexual crimes law dated 1956. No archiving however for anal rape in the UK.

Europol offered Spain information on his possible whereabouts in Spain, but he had managed to move on. Eventually, the Group III of the Narcotics Udyco – Costa del Sol discovered where he was hiding in Alhaurín el Grande, where he was detained last Tuesday.
After judicial diligences, he is now under the auspices of the National Court for his extradition.